User blog:Moritzva/Consortium Ep. 1: Valev Gets A Job
Did you know the average person spends over nine thousand, one hundred, and twenty-five hours asleep throughout their entire lives? An overplayed jingle reverberated throughout the small tavern waiting room, the white paint on the walls worn and overly bright. It hurt his eyes, and by the looks on the faces around him, it surely did not light up a single man's day. He wallowed in the smell; the stench of still, bland air, reeking of paint, wood, and formerly smoked cigars. Rather rancid cigars, really. To add insult to injury, the chairs. The rough wood hurt his butt and odd angle made his back ache. A bullet he could take, but this was just torture. A prickly, misshapen chair far too small for him. He shifted and shook in his seat uncomfortably, grumbling under his breath, before looking up to notice the stairs of each soul in the isolated room, all focused on him. "...What?" He responded with a facade of confident, defiantly crossing his arms, despite the obvious discomfort, both physically and emotionally. An old geezer sitting next to him scooted his chair away from him. He groaned slightly and looked down at his clothes. It was a rather cheap wear, but styled specially by him, to the best of his capabilities. Inexpensive leather ironed out and stretched a fair bit below the waist, dyed a clean white. Brown and gray was overused for adventurers, he thought. A band tightly tied the coat to his waist, the clothing hugging his rather athletic physique. His hair dyed red; not a dark red, but a vibrant and colorful red of emotion. He personally thought it fit him far better his normal brown. His facial features were sharp and quite handsome. Not overly masculine, but with fair skin and a smile that bordered on both cute and seductive. Compared to the rustic interior of the building, he was more of a modern sight, albeit on a short budget. In other words, he stood out. Badly. Good looks meant little, and he perhaps overdressed. Just a tad. He could see it in the eyes of the woman behind the counter; she disregarded him as just another flamboyant rich boy. Oh, could she not be more wrong. Precisely, he was a flamboyant poor ''boy. Homeless poor, actually. With all this mind, he questioned himself why he was even there. "Valev, come in!" A disembodied voice crossed the door and woke Valev up from his nap, the words as sharp and alerting as a dagger to the chest. Oh yea, that was why. Humming the tune to an 'ol pop song from his home, Valev pranced on into the room quietly, passing by a pissed off short fellow with a face of red and a tense stature of anger. One left the room, one came in. The office was actually quite pretty, compared to the waiting room. While the paint was still perfectly tacky, at least it was fresh. Valev let out a sigh of relief as he rested on a chair that didn't feel like a bed of thorns. Across the desk was a man likely just as old as Valev in looks, his eyes blue and hair brown, dressed in complimentary colors of brown and gray, the skin on his hands visibly as tough as leather. Valev gave one last passing view to the short wizard that stormed off. "Guess someone didn't get to be the protagonist, huh?" He joked, getting a chuckle from the guy behind the counter. "Something like that. Welcome, Valev. My name is Naguib and welcome to my offices. I assume you're here for a position within the Holy Stone Guild?" "Well, it's either that or I just feel like wasting your time. It's nice to meet you, Naguib. You're the swordsman, I assume?" Valev guessed off the bat merely from eyeing up the person, up and down. Slim yet athletic figure, just like himself, but a bit more stocky and stern. Possibly just as pretty, if he bothered to smile more. "Why, yes I am. How did you know?" Taken just a bit off-guard, he inquired further in Valev's guess. "Because what kind of mages have biceps as big as mine?" Valev responded with pride, leaning back and showing off his arms. "Prideful, aren't you?" "Of course. I don't believe in being humble just for the sake of being humble; at least, not with teammates. When you're in battle, you don't have ''time to determine which of your allies are actually far stronger than they let on to be. When arrows are lodging themselves in your throats, it is not the time in which you suddenly need half the team to pull their unassuming badassery out of their butts in the most disjointed way possible." He responded quite bluntly and with resolve. His beliefs were strong and he wasn't afraid to show them. "...A unique perspective. Well, if that's the case, may you showcase your abilities for me?" Naguib responded, having recovered quickly from Valev's offbeat, shock-and-awe type answers. With one pencil he jotted down a quick series of notes, eyes still focused on the applying man. A giddy smile creeped across Valev's face. "I thought you'd never ask." Excitement coursed through his veins as he suddenly rose to his feat. Naguib didn't know wether he should have felt interest or dread. A short hop backwards, and Valev was towering above the lone, tan-skinned interviewer. "Summoner of weapons!" Mana burst from the seams, crackling between the palm of his hand and the tender fabric of reality, ripping forth the walls of the dimensional space in the crucible of magic. A crux of power and will combusted with energy as Valev took his free hand and plunged it into the eternal emptiness of the handheld void, violently tearing a finely shined, lethally sharp mix between an axe and a sword, spinning the blade around his grip with the flick of his wrist. "Master of the weaponry arts!" And, in one swift show of bravado, he flung the whirring circle of death towards Naguib, the wind howling as it was cleaved through. And before Naguib could raise his hand, everything changed. A flash, a swap, and right as the image of the lustrous weapon of death reached his head, a new image followed. Valev sat right on the other side of Naguib's desk, catching the spinning axe with a grin, feet kicked up on the counter as it spun around, around, to a stop. He was the interviewer, and Naguib was the interviewee. "And controller of time and space!" "...Valev, get out of my chair." Naguib got up from the scrappy wooden piece he sat in and marched towards the armed newcomer. Valev was visibly disappointed by his lack of a reaction. "My reign is short, but it shall be remembered forever." He retorted in a forced British accent, hopping over the desk and back into his original seat. "...Right, now, that was quite the show. A chronomancer spellblade. I believe you have some uses on our team. Now, it's seem we've gotten ahead of ourselves. Let us do some formal introductions." Despite the hard face, Naguib was clearly enjoying the interview. It was... different. Enjoyable. "My name is Naguib Antonios, son of Zaki Antonios. Each of the Antonios clan has been both a fighter and a strategist: father, grandfather, great grandfather, great great grandfather, and so on. The Holy Stone is the culmination of the fruits of my labors, and if you are to join us, I hope you contribute with all of your heart." Honesty and noble will filled his words, and he tossed the prompt back to Valev, patiently awaiting his answer. "Valev 'Valev' Valev. Homeless man with a bundle of blades, a dash of experience, and five kilograms of way ''too much free time." His words were swift and simple, direct and to the point. But he wasn't done, not at all. A sigh escaped his mouth. "I'm going to be honest. I may not be like the other people walking through your doors; I dress like I'm a hobo from the future, I take a wee bit too much enjoyance in my flamboyancy, and my antics err on the side of excessive danger. But if I can give you one thing to consider? Maybe something different is exactly what you need. Let me on your team, Naguib, and I promise I won't disappoint." A hand extended forward, offering a sapling of new relations to be sparked by just a single acceptance. The time was now, and Valev never liked to dawdle. He thought for only a moment, before extending a hand and meeting Valev's iron clad grip with his own, confident smiles matching eachother perfectly. "You are a good speaker, Valev. You'll be high in contention." A dance invisibly erupted inside of Valev's soul as he basked in the glory of acceptance. "Thank you, man. Can't wait until I can get out there, y'know? Beat the shit out of monsters and save the innocent!" He replied with a happy laugh, leaning back in his chair. "You know, we actually don't do much of the second part. The Holy Stone focuses iour efforts on exploring dungeons and recovering artifacts, which includes killing monsters." "Good. I never liked saving the innocent anyways." They both chuckled for a short while, before Naguib continued. "Well, I suppose I should tell you more about my team. I'm the fighter and main strategist, and including you, we'll have two frontline fighters, our proud Druid of Al'Kira, a blade you'll never see coming, and a prodigy priest born from a family of talented magic casters." And at once, the air grew tense. "...A priest?" "Yes, a priest." Naguib raised an eyebrow, a bit wary now. The walls of his mind constricted and narrowed, a heavy cloud fogging his judgement and rational thought. "So a priest, nice. You said he's a prodigy?" Valev's eyes began to open wide, an odd sense of obsession overtaking him. Stiffness spread through the muscles, tying him in place. "Just... How talented is this priest?" "Err, well... A majority of his family were talented casters in high positions. Archmages, war leaders, respected researchers... Some could even control The Consortium, so I've heard." He explained, somewhat cautiously speaking of their team member. The message was clear, though; Naguib wasn't lying, and this healer was the real deal. "Powerful enough to revive people?" He shot a question back without a second thought, his mind frantically fraying itself in a maelstrom of emotions. And Naguib could see it. His voice was growing shakier, losing the smooth yet loud bluster it once had. "...Yes, potentially-" "What about people without remains? Lost bodies, y'know?" "Valev, if you have someone you'd like re-" "Because I could use something like that. Trust me, it's really important." "Valev, we can arrange something, just-" "Trust me, it's important! The sooner the better, Naguib!" "Valev, listen-" "Naguib, I need to do this ''now." "Valev-" "The sooner the better! Where are they, I could go meet them right now-" "Valev." The air grew silent after the storm. Naguib shot a glare at the suddenly awoken Valev, whose face grew red in embarrassment. Suddenly he realized what he had done. Emotion had overwhelmed him, and now he could only shrink down in his chair, his senses dulled in the cruel realization. The air grew still, and the tension grew thicker after that mess of an incident. "He's young, Valev. Resurrection magic is incredibly difficult to master, and he's far too young to have it mastered. While I believe he could learn it in the future, it's beyond his capabilities at the moment." He could barely open his mouth for another response. "...Just messing with you?" Valev lied, to no avail, obviously. He looked down at the floor as Naguib shook his head. "Look, we'll get back to you later. Alright?" The coldness of his tone sold it for Valev. The wannabe adventurer stood up slowly, feeling only resentment to his sudden ontake of emotions, to himself. There were more tries in the future, though, he thought. And he would fail them again, and again, and again, until one finally scored as a success. And when that happened, he could finally rest in happiness. After all, they did say they'd get back to him, right? They never got back to him. Category:Blog posts Category:Stories Category:Short Stories Category:The Infinite Consortium